Author: BWild

The company no longer manufactures its own smartphones but it is selling its name for branded devices.

TCL Communications entered into a BlackBerry licensing agreement to create and manufacture branded mobile devices. BlackBerry CEO John Chen recently said “BlackBerry is no longer just about the smartphone, but the smart in the phone.”

The goal is to continue the production of branded devices in the market without making them, themselves.

Chen assured customers that “when you see our logo it means security, from our class-leading enterprise software to devices secured by BlackBerry software.”

This is not the first time BlackBerry has worked with TCL Communications. In fact, it released two different Android-based smartphones in a partnership with that company. The DTEK 50 and DTEK 60 are both devices resulting from collaborations between the two firms. TCL Communications also manufactures Alcatel-branded smartphones.

The long-term BlackBerry licensing agreement is only the latest in that company’s turnaround strategy.

The partnership is a way for BlackBerry to place some distance between itself and handset manufacturing. The company can turn its focus toward growth as a security software and services company. As a part of this agreement TCL Communications will not only design, manufacture and sell BlackBerry-branded devices. It will also provide customer support for the products they sell.

BlackBerry COO and general manager of mobility solutions, Ralph Pini, said this partnership with TCL Communication is a core move in their strategy. It lets the company put “the ‘smart in the phone’ by providing state-of-the-art security and device software on a platform that mobile users prefer and are comfortable with.”

According to recent media reports, the DTEK 70 will be the next smartphone launched with the BlackBerry licensing brand agreement. This mobile device will be based on Android – as have been the last few models – and will have a fingerprint sensor. That feature will be uniquely positioned in the spacebar of the distinctive physical keyboard. It will have a 2.0 GHz Qualcomm processor, 3GB of RAM, 32GB of internal storage and a 4.5 inch display. The rear-facing camera will be 18 megapixels and the front-facing camera will be 8 megapixels.

A Trustlook survey showed that consumers will ignore certain risks in exchange for easy shopping.

Mobile commerce security is an important issue this holiday season. Seventy one percent of smartphone owners plan to use their mobile devices to help them along some point of the shopping journey.

Trustlook has recently released a survey with results from which it has made its holiday predictions.

The Trustlook survey focused on smartphone users with Android phones. The goal was to accurately forecast consumer behaviors throughout the holiday shopping season this year. What they found was that 40 percent of the survey participants actually prefer shopping over smartphones. This despite the mobile commerce security concerns that have been holding back the channel’s adoption.

Another 18 percent of the survey participants said that their preference was to shop in-store during the holidays. The results revealed that 43 percent of smartphone users will be making over $250 in purchases over their devices. The top m-commerce apps were identified as Amazon, eBay and Walmart.

That said, shoppers haven’t taken adequate mobile commerce security steps to protect themselves.

Even though 70.35 percent of participants in the survey said they planned to make a purchase over a smartphone or tablet, they were not protecting their personal and financial data. In fact, a wide majority of people hadn’t even installed security software. Sixty four percent of survey respondents did not have a mobile security app installed on their device.

Trustlook CEO, Zllan Zhang, said “Mobile shoppers need to be more cautious than ever,” adding that “This risk isn’t going away as mobile shopping activity ramps up.”

This is an interesting finding as concerns over mobile security have been among the top cited reasons that people have held off shopping over smartphones. It appears that there is a growing group of people who are moving ahead with smartphone based shopping regardless of that potential issue.

The hope from security firms is that if consumers are willing to ignore the mobile commerce security risk, they will at least take more steps to protect themselves. There are several small steps such as security apps that can help to keep sensitive data safer.